Horsemen drop first opener in franchise history as RBs continue to fall

It wasn’t quite what the fans were expecting after 6 straight opening night wins, but the 16 point (three time defending COL champion) favorites were surprisingly dropped by last year’s runner up – Strictly Southern.

Julio led all skill players from both sides of the contest with 23 with an amazing Thursday night performance that somehow didn’t even include a touchdown. But, as we’ve seen historically, the Horsemen have often found struggles following a solid Thursday Night Football outing. In 2017, both of the Horsemen losses were on the weeks of such performances. Todd Gurley took home 32 in week 3 against the Drunken Aces… only to lose by 20. Then, in week 11, Antonio Brown would score 32… only to suffer the worst loss in franchise history against the lowly Straight Laced.

Nothing really popped about Strictly Southern, it was what imploded on the Horsemen that would lead to this embarrassing opening loss. Leonard Fournette would start strong, posting 7 points in the first quarter before being sidelined by a hamstring issue for the remainder of the game. A sad sight as the Horsemen would have Emmanuel Sanders (WR6, 24.5 points) and Isaiah Crowell (RB5, 22.2 points) on the bench to watch the disastrous scene.

The Saints defense, one that seemed a sure thing against a Tampa team running out a backup quarterback, would be the true embarrassment, though. With their -9 point finish they would be in the 99.99878th percentile of bad performances by someone in a starting position for the Electric Horsemen. In fact, this was the least points ever scored by an individual in franchise history. The Horsemen have lost 100% of games when posting negative defensive performances of -4 or worse. The last time it happened? Week 11 of 2017, the same game Antonio crushed Thursday night.

Strictly Southern now emerges as the clear league favorite, and the Horsemen will likely have no opportunity to avenge themselves until the championship game.

And so brings what looks to be the final 2 game series of The Battle of TC Jester, and the first series that will see no money on the line with the refusal of the Nosebleeds to renew with any terms more than a trophy exchange. A fitting end of a “rivalry” that has not played up to its billing since 2012 – the last time the ‘bleeds won the series (in a split). Not only have the Nosebleeds not won the series since 2012, but they also haven’t won the opening of the series since ever.

They enter this year’s series with a familiar core, based around the recently absent Andrew Luck (who hasn’t played in the series since the first round of the 2016 playoffs) who is 5th on the leaderboard for most points against the Horsemen with 189 through his 8 starts for a 23.63 average. He’s joined by mainstays Melvin Gordon, Jordan Howard, Mike Evans & Rob Gronkowski – with a few randos scattered here and there. They’re coming off a huge upset over 3rd and Unpredictable, despite an onslaught of points scored by Alvin Kamara – who’s definitely going to get hurt this year. This victory took him to the top of the Dainty North, if only for a short time.

The defending champions come into this one a little more battered than they were last week. Most painful of them all is the continued hold out of Le’Veon Bell, the active RB point leader for the Horsemen. Newly acquired Leonard Fournette remains a game time decision – a game time which is late afternoon, limiting replacements to Phillip Lindsay, Kerryon Johnson and Rex Burkhead. Speaking of Rex, he hasn’t been practicing due to a concussion and will be facing one of the most brutal defenses in the game. The Horsemen could very well bring in Crowell before news breaks if management feels prospects are grim.

Additional factors likely to come into play are the Nosebleeds’ habit of outsmarting themselves with QB and defensive decisions. Will they play Luck, Roethlisberger or Ryan? I imagine they’ll just happen to play the worst of the three. Will they play the Ravens on Thursday night or the Texans on Sunday (*The Nosebleeds benched the Ravens for the Texans prior to game time… which proved to be a good decision as of 10:43 on Thursday night)? Why do they have 3 quarterbacks and 2 defenses? So many questions.

The answers are to come this weekend as the Horsemen enter the game as 12.7 point favorites (extending their streak of being the favorite to 25) with a 62.5% chance of victory.

Last week’s picks went 2-3, with a big expansion team victory and the worst team ever nearly squeaking one past the Berries.

In this week’s action:

• Straight Laced @ Extreme Baby Throwers – XBT oftentimes gets ahead of themselves and anoints themselves contenders early in the season. This year is no different, as Straight Laced will rebound from their embarrassing week 1 loss to expansion team, Dangerous Angels.
• Heavy Pistols @ 3rd and Unpredictable – This will be one of several blow outs this week. The Pistols have improved week over week, but are severely over matched.
• Legs With Holes @ Strictly Southern – Legs With Holes knows they’re bad and made every possible decision to make them worse at the draft. They are obviously throwing this season for the first pick of 2019… but they’ll pick the wrong person, anyway.
• Drunken Aces @ Bumpy’s Berries – In a battle of unbeatens, the generally awful Aces will pull out a huge upset over the Berries behind the resurgent Adrian Peterson.
• Dangerous Angels @ Closet Hillbilly – In another upset, probably the biggest of the season, the Dangerous Angels will keep the dream alive and take down Closet Hillbilly.

The Baby Throwers jump 24% and the Laces fall 17% – while Strictly Southern takes over the top spot with losses by the Horsemen and Unpredictable.